I am convinced that Facebook can read my mind and is plotting against me. I do fully understand how crazy I sound saying that. However, I am so convinced of this I have recently boycotted Facebook. So maybe I am crazy, but nonetheless I still can’t deal with Facebook at the moment.

This is true.

Oh wait, I almost forgot to explain why I think Facebook is plotting against me. My recent heartbreak friended me on Facebook before we stopped talking. Long story I won’t go into quite yet (until it stops hurting so much), but the important point for now is that I am still friends with him. Facebook friends that is.

This discussion should take place post break-up

Now the conspiracy part. I have no mutual friends with him. We never post on eachother’s walls. We have chatted a few times via private messaging, but that is nothing compared to how many times I message my close friends. I have hundreds of friends, and many of them I post on their walls almost daily. Others I message almost every hour of the day. I have many friends with 50+ mutual friends. Now who would you guess shows up in my ‘top friends’ on my page almost every single day? Yep, that’s right, it’s him.

I first noticed this about a week and half ago. I was extremely irritated because I was just obsessing over him, of course, and thought it was some kind of dreadful life coincidence I was supposed to take notice of. I refreshed my page over and over until he was there no more.

But…he came back the next day. And the next. And the next. I was so horrified by this constant reminder of him that I needed to figure out why this was. Was he looking at my page every day? I certainly was not visiting his ever. I had to find out.

I Googled it. “how does facebook generate top friends on profile”.

After reading way too many articles about this subject, the general consensus is that your top friends are generated by the amount of public interaction you have with them. There are many answers out there to this question, however, the articles I read in which they actually have contacted Facebook representatives have stated this. Other factors include how many mutual friends you have and if they are family. Facebook claims it has nothing to do with private interactions or the amount of times you visit someone’s profile.

I personally am having a hard time believing this. One of the articles I read is my favorite, stating they believe it has everything to do with how often a person looks at your profile. This statement, although not backed by Facebook whatsoever, seems more believable to me.

So I am left with this. Either Facebook statements are correct, but they have also built an alien robot algorithm that probes into my thoughts and decides my top friends according to who would torture me the most. OR the Facebook statements are not correct and top friends are generated through non-public interactions as well as stalking factors, such as how many times people look at your profile.